By Andrew Irumba
After the media broke the story on the over 60 billion syndicated theft involving internal bank of Uganda insider collaborating with external criminal elements that hacked into the bank’s accounts and transferred the funds to their accounts in Japan and the UK, Ugandans have since been left in total shock with no statement coming from the Central Bank to explain exactly what happens in their house of wolves, save for the line line minister Henry Musasizi, who painfully and helplessly admitted on the floor of parliament,that it was true the Central Bank has been hacked and robbed clean. Although he was quick to add a rider that; “it wasn’t Shs 62B!” But even if it was Shs 1m, it was your job to protect it! Anyway, that’s for another day.
In this episode, we take you process by process, what our IT experts, linked to the mighty Investigative website, TheSpy have since told us about bank accounts hacking and corruption at the central bank. Bank accounts can be hacked through a variety of cyber attacks;
Phishing: Hackers may trick you into entering your login credentials on a fake website that looks like your bank.
Malware; Hackers may send you a link or attachment that contains malware such as a keylogger which can capture your passwords as you type them.
Brute force; Hackers may use software to guess your password repeatedly.
Data Breaches; Your login details may be leaked in a data breach.
Weak passwords; If you use weak passwords, it might be easy for hackers to guess.
Man in the Middle (MITM); Hackers may use MITM to intercept your communications.
From our reliable inner sources and IT experts, the 60 billion theft from the Bank of Uganda points to weak information technology internal controls at the country’s top financial institution.
Even if the bank account numbers and respective login credentials to these accounts were shared by collaborating internal wolves (BoU Staff) as we have always known them, the president needs to push for serious and robust IT internal controls to avoid a repeat. “He needs to take the bull by the horn earlier than ever before.mOre especially with the death of his bulldozer, Prof.Emanuel Mutebile. No wonder the president has failed to get his successor 3 yrs later. You know that man was highly feared here and respected,he couldn’t allow certain things to happen here, even without first consulting his boss. He was very confident of his decisions,” added our inside source.
Confidence in the banking sector has been wanning in Uganda, as Ugandans are scared of being served counterfeit (Post bank case of 500m Counterfeit introduced in official banking system), Outright banking wolves disguising as hackers, our IT expert says the Hackers are Ugandans working with external players, there is a new trend in Kampala of get rich quick, a culture we must condemn and despise as Ugandans regardless of Government’s silence. We see tycoons mushrooming every week, the Government is never concerned where the source of their money is. Uganda is slowly turning into a money laundering ground.
Meanwhile, we understand from our internal source that the 60bn theft is a very small amount compared to the theft that goes into bank closures by the central bank.
Whenever a bank is closed, Central Bank staff rejoice as it’s time to eat using the legal cover provided by the Financial Institutions Act 2004. “Let me tell you my brother Irumba, that’s not even money to these BoU staff here. So you know how much money is syndicated when a bank is being closed by these goons? Do you know how much money was stolen during the closure of your friend Tycoon Sudhir’s Crane Bank? You’re jocking,” added our source.
From creative accounting to under valuation of assets, depositors in these banks have been left to cry foul as their deposits are stolen under the guise of insolvency. I’m told the central bank liquidators ensure they dispose of assets of banks under liquidation at the lowest possible prices and must work hard in any way to portray as if these banks were insolvent just to steal depositors funds, These are the wolves the president has put his trust in to oversee our nations crumbling banking sector. This year alone two banks EFC,MCBL and we now hear of Standard Chartered bank retail section have exited without any new entrant. You’ve also heard Equity Bank MD is exiting for ‘greener pastures’, which pastures are greener than the pastures in the Banking sector?! It’s because he doesn’t want his career to sink with the rotting system,” said our source.
No economy in the world is worth its weight without a vibrant banking sector, secondly, it makes the Uganda Revenue Authority’s Job of tax collection very hard if you don’t have a bankable economy, people are keeping cash at their homes. We are hoping the president is not going to be reactive on such matters, but proactive in ensuring criminals are removed from our central bank and proper controls established. I rest my case.
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